The importance of mining to the australian economy should not be underestimated it's the state that
provides the bulk of australia's exports the bulk of australia's growing national income and
people in their thousands are flocking to western australia the world's response to climate change
is simultaneously reshaping the global economy global politics and the global energy.
It's 15 systems 35 the top in perth with cloud clearing apparently the clean energy
transition will have big implications for western australia where 94 of the state's
187 billion dollars worth of exports come from the carbon intensive resources sector.
There's no doubt at all that mining and the mining
industry in general is incredibly important to western australia.
this is the quinana nickel refinery south of perth owned by bhp the world's largest mining company
i've worked here for 10 years and before that i worked in the oil and gas industry
and before that i was a climate scientist i get asked a lot you know
how can you live with yourself how can you sleep at night like people have asked me that
and i think i could be on the outside and i could throw stones or i can be inside an organization
and try and change it from within as the vice president of climate change and sustainability
it's fiona wilde's job to reign in the company's carbon emissions
i think it's really important for people to hold companies to account so what i want to do i want
to make sure that when bhp sets a target we have a really good idea about how we're going to get
there maybe 20 years ago industry was working in an environment where policymakers were setting
the rules and setting the pace of action on climate change that's not the case anymore
in 2019 bhp pledged to go net zero by 2050 while the mining giant is offloading its mines that
produce coal for power stations it's holding on to its high quality coal mines critical
for steel making coal does not have a long-term place in our portfolio we've let the market know
that we're looking for options to exit the energy coal business you need to have iron
ore and metallurgical coal currently to produce a steel that's required to build
the wind turbines and the other infrastructure that actually enables emissions to be reduced
bhp believes reducing its emissions is vital for the company's long-term future i can't see
a downside for bhp of action on climate change bhp actually does best in a world that rapidly
decarbonizes so for us action on climate change isn't a trade-off with economic value action on
climate change is completely aligned with how we build the most value for bhp they have a very
difficult track record when it comes to carbon emissions now i think the pressure is really on
them to change it's been building since the paris agreement but now it's really serious
Australia accounts for just .3 of the world's population but produces nearly 1.3 percent of
global emissions while 50 of our big miners refiners and metal manufacturers have plans
to reduce emissions less than half of those companies have targets to achieve net zero in
their operations by 2050 or sooner a controversial issue is whether australian companies should be
partly responsible for the so-called scope 3 emissions created offshore by their customers
i think it's somewhere north of five percent if you count our exports so it massively changes
australia's emissions profile if you count our exports increasingly what people are saying is
that scope 3 emissions has to be everyone's problem the speed of that transition could
really threaten australia's economic future unless we get on board with it and understand it
whether or not you believe it's big business or government that's best placed to tackle climate
change the reality is it's business that's moving first and fast towards a carbon net zero future
the green economy transition is the largest economic opportunity
australia has ever had it is our largest single job creator australia should 10,
20, 30 years from now be a resource-driven economy it's just we'll have different types of resources
a major backer of renewables is co-founder of software giant atlassian mike cannon brooks with
more than a billion dollars invested in renewable energy transport and sustainable agriculture
we need to have a legislated 2050 net zero target with interim milestones with real legislative uh
teeth that gives certainty to the uh to industry to business on how to invest to get there but
ultimately we need to get there and we can't do it all in 2045. this is the sort of thing that
you know we can't eat cakes for the next 25 years and then suddenly go and get fit at the end of it
he sees the most carbon intensive industries being squeezed out by market forces whether
or not people are buying coal whether or not people are buying gas isn't going to be up to us
right our naivety to think that we control those markets is baffling to me they're going to move
away from that whether we like it or not investors are realizing both public company investors but
also banks insurance companies that that industry is not going to be around in 20 years time
while the future of coal is in douse the fossil fuel remains the largest
source of energy in australia's national electricity market
but according to the energy market operator coal fire generation is expected to fall with nine of
the remaining 16 coal-fired stations in the national electricity market expected to close
before 2040. the value of australia's energy coal exports is also forecast to fall from 21 billion
last financial year to 15 billion this year what really matters in terms of coal is what happens
if your customer has to cut their admissions substantially that is going to affect you
this goes to making people's dreams their homes their cars
struggle street wall street it doesn't matter good to see you mate good to see you you made
your fortune mining iron ore and fortescue emits two million tonnes of greenhouse gas each year
what's been the cost in the making of your fortune in terms of contributing to climate change
yeah i haven't calculated that it it crazily none of those things got taken to account apart from
the last couple of years but i think it's it's not a cost which society should uh shoulder i think
there is a cost if you're producing something which has an extra emissions and you do one of
two things you either get those emissions down or you pay for that cost fortescue metals group
chairman andrew twiggy forrest wants to make his company carbon neutral in nine years time but
he doesn't think fortescue should also be partly responsible for his customers emissions shouldn't
your carbon footprint also include the emissions generated when your iron ore is processed
overseas no i i think i think that is a bridge too far what i need to do is is not a peric victory
or a virtue signaling like saying i'm going to try and stop my customers from using coal i can't
stop them using coal what i'm now working on is a replacement for coal and that's green hydrogens
to make steel in a way that doesn't damage the planet it's you know the holy grail
in a sense for the australian iron ore industry we need to grasp that opportunity we need to say with
a little bit of vision a little bit of drive and a little bit of risk could we create a massive new
industry which creates the steel which the world needs which is zero carbon steel that's our future
i do speak to our political leaders and they are moving government won't front
run in this industry fortis hughes decided to step up and take that first move of risk
but i believe it's going to work and will keep on persevering until it does work the reason we're
in this climate problem is the markets failed because they did not recognize the true cost
of using fossil fuels the former chair of the australian coal association ian dunlop
says business alone can't solve climate change with the urgency required
markets are very helpful but they have to have regulation around them
which reflects the true values of society in other words you don't let sewage flow down the street
you know you price that you stop people doing it you regulate against it now we haven't done that
with carmen we should have done the economic shift away from carbon intensive industries is happening
largely because the climate science tells us the world needs to act decisively this decade
to avoid the worst climate impacts the best scientific evidence in fact shows that once
we stop burning fossil fuels once we stop adding carbon pollution to the atmosphere
the warming of the planet stabilizes fairly quickly within a few years
so there's an immediate and direct impact of our efforts to reduce carbon emissions
we know a lot about the science of climate change we know what's going
to happen we know what effects are going to be at a large level
the cost of that the impact to australia is in the trillions of dollars we are going to
pay those costs we have continued to be a regressive force in international
climate politics largely because we're the third largest exporter of fossil fuels in the world
the minister for energy and emissions reduction angus taylor told 730 australia's track record
is one of reducing emissions faster than our developed country peers that australia's emissions
fell faster than those of canada new zealand japan korea and the united states between 2005 and 2018.
don't let it be said by those who want to talk australia down and what we're doing on missions
that we're not carrying our loan we are and we are leading the way we're not going to meet our
climate change targets through punishing taxes i'm not going to tax our industries off the planet
the fossil fuel industry is perhaps our most dangerous industry in the world right now because
it'll be economics which force them to change but they won't go down without a serious fight
hi i'm leigh sales thanks for watching this story if you'd
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